Thursday, December 11, 2008

Restaurant Deathwatch PDX: Lucier update

My post a few days ago about Lucier being on the ropes appear to have come true already. A post on Portland Food and Drink today is suggesting the place may shut their doors as soon as this weekend. We may not have seen the last of Lucier, though. At dinner out with two friends in the restauarnt biz last night, they said they had heard that Lucier may attempt a relaunch, perhaps as soon as late this/early next year, a la Ten-01, which a few years ago performed one of the most remarkable Lazarus imitations in local food history. Sympathies to those who may soon find themselves out of work.

It is a terrible time to be unemployed, but I fear that after everyone's holiday distractions are over, the first quarter for restaurants here in Portland (and everywhere else for that matter) is going to be brutal, and a big shake out is coming. Two articles in the NYT (here and here) highlight how more people ar cutting back on going out and cooking at home, and that trend will only increase after the first of the year. Scary times, indeed.

UPDATE 3:30pm- Lucier is a confirmed casualty as of this weekend. Wine oriented minds want to know: what's going to happen to that million dollars worth of inventory. A better question: why did they have a million dollars worth of wine??!